Putin feared Clinton would stand up to him in the Middle East and Europe.
By talking about "America First!", Donald Trump, while clearly unpredictable, gave the impression that he would concern himself with matters in the USA and, consequently, leave Putin to do whats in the Middle East and Europe. It was not so much that Donald Trump would be Putin's puppet but that he would not be an enemy.
It must be admitted that Donald Trump has criticized President Obama every day of his presidency but kept his lip buttoned about Putin. It looked like Putin got what he wanted.
Even now, with Tomahawk missiles raining down on a Syrian air base, Russia has not been criticized by Trump and the Russians were warned about the attack.
Trump wants to have his cake and eat it. He will have infuriated Putin with the attack on a small Syrian airport but he will still want to be pals with Putin. He doesn't get it. This said, Trump needs to keep infuriating Putin and frustrating the Russian's imperial ambition.
Is anyone else concerned it took 50 cruise missiles to take out one air base?
/---- No, it's just you Snowflake